Product family redesign using additive manufacturing

In this study we investigate how we can effectively redesign a product family using additive manufacturing (AM). Specifically, we propose an integrated approach to product family redesign using platform metrics for a product family that uses AM. The proposed approach can help identify what to platform and how to platform with AM. We employ a variety metric to measure the amount of redesign for each component, a commonality metric to capture different types of commonality, and Design Structure Matrix (DSM) to analyze a platform architecture. After integrating these metrics, we can optimize balancing the tradeoffs between commonality and differentiation of components. Components that offer little variety for the market can be made common and part of the platform while components that must be varied to achieve market requirements should not be platformed and may be easily customized with AM. In order to facilitate customization of AM components, we can evaluate redesign of platform interfaces to help embed flexibility and modularity into the product family. To investigate the impact of the integrated approach, we apply the proposed approach to a family of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) as a case study. The results show the proposed approach can be effectively employed to identify ways to redesign the UAV family to improve the balance of commonality and variety of future product offerings.